Genetic
by nova A
Summary: One very long night will change Sara's life. Angst, GS, and some hatin' on Sophia Curtis, just for kicks. First story I've posted in quite awhile...
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: **Hi all,  
If anyone recalls (or cares), back when I was working on _Misplaced_ I had mentioned that it was because I needed a break from all the angst I had been writing. Well, I never got around to posting said angst, mostly because I wasn't completely satisfied with how it was turning out. Anyway, now I'm starting to hear rumors on the internet about the big two-part upset that CSI is brewing in November... and I'm getting that nervous feeling that it might resemble this story,which I wrote last spring and which has been sitting on my computer ever since. I'd feel like a chump if I spent all that time writing and couldn't post it because it was similar to an actual episode. Plaigerism really isn't my thing, so my new plan is to get the jump on 'em by posting my story, or at least the first few chapters of it. Hopefully I'll untangle the ending before the November sweeps roll around. Here it is, for better or worse.

**Disclaimer: **If they were mine, I probably wouldn't live in a studio apartment.

Genetic   
By nova A

Prologue

_She stood and watched from a few feet away, still gripping the knife in her hand._

_She watched, and she waited patiently._

_Waited until the blood stopped flowing, until his chest didn't move anymore, not even a slow, labored rise and fall. Until the faint gurgling coming from his throat ceased. She waited until his eyes glossed over and his limbs relaxed, perfectly still against the stained mattress. _

_Only then did she pick up the phone on her beside table and calmly dial 911._

_She never noticed the small peaked face that peered, eyes frozen wide with terror, around the half-open bedroom door._

I.

Lights twirl and flicker against the night, blue, red, white, creating unsettling patterns on Sara's face, the sidewalk and nearby houses. The sirens are off now. Sara has always found it odd that such a shattering cacophony of light can be so silent. Her fingers are numb. She thinks that the uncontrollable quaking coming from deep inside her might actually be shivers; the night is chilly, and she didn't put on her coat before she went into the house. She figured it would be warm inside, so she just wore her CSI vest over a wine-colored T-shirt. Now she stands alone, an island on the sidewalk, cold but not really feeling it, trying not to feel anything. Her gut is a mass of knots, like worms are crawling over each other, writhing and twisting. Her body quivers. Phrases tattoo themselves on her brain, thumping steady as her own heartbeat.

Sara killed someone tonight.  
beat.  
She killed someone.  
beat.  
She took a life.  
beat.  
She's a killer.

The words continually rearrange themselves, cascading through her in sickly adrenaline-fueled ripples. She's trying to resign herself to this, fit it into the self that she knows, the self that will never be the same again. She's tipped over the edge, over to the other side. Across a thick well-defined black line, to a place that has always been reserved for other people. Bad guys. Murderers, psychopaths and suspects.

Her mother.

But not her. Never Sara.

Police swarm around her, interviewing witnesses and talking amongst themselves. The paramedics have already left. There wasn't really anything for them to do. The Coroner's van has replaced their ambulance. David glances at her, then looks away as he helps load the black-bagged body. The cops nearest her break their huddle for a moment to look her way, then go back to talking. Sara cringes, wanting to shrink in on herself, feeling her throat tighten. She had almost forgotten the feel of those hard stares, how it was when people looked at her _that_ way. She doesn't want this label, this way of being. Desperately doesn't want this to become one of the things that defines her. Sara Sidle, daughter, sister, friend, criminalist. Killer.

_I don't believe that genes are a predictor of violent behavior. _

Oh, how desperately she'd wanted to believe that he was right.

And suddenly she feels a gentle touch on her back. She gasps, glances around wildly to find her jacket being slipped over her shoulders. Sara's startled eyes meet wide blue ones in a pale heart-shaped face framed by long, slightly mussed blonde hair. There's a shallow but nasty-looking scrape on Sophia's chin, and another one streaked across her cheekbone. The space around her left eye is darkening fast to a mottled purple-blue. She holds out a steaming paper cup.

"I thought you might want some tea," Sophia says softly.

Sara swallows and pauses for a moment, sizing the other woman up. The blue gaze is steady and solemn. Sophia holds the white cup carefully, like a chalice, a peace offering. Her own puffy coat is zipped to the very top. Within the shadow of her collar Sara can barely make out more developing bruises, ringing Sophia's white throat like a morbid necklace.

"Thanks," Sara mutters finally, accepting. To her credit, Sophia pretends not to notice the way Sara's hand trembles when it closes around the cup. They stand together silently for a moment, not looking at each other. Sophia is a little closer then Sara would normally find acceptable. But tonight, just for right now, Sara decides she will not think of how she feels about this woman. Or more importantly, how Grissom feels about her.

"I called Gil," Sophia says in a low voice.

Sara blows on the tea. It's scalding. She wonders where it came from.  
"He's on his way," Sophia continues almost absently.

Sara takes a sip and swallows, burning first her tongue and then her throat. She reaches her other hand up and adjusts her coat, holding it capelike around her shoulders. Her gaze follows the Coroner's van as it slowly makes its way through the crowd of pajama clad looky-loos and professionally dressed local newscasters. It disappears around the corner and Sara shuts her eyes. The police lights flash on, finding their way through the skin of her eyelids. She feels them reverberate off the back of her skull.

beat.  
flash.  
She took a life tonight.  
beat.  
flash.  
She's a killer.


	2. Chapter 2

Prologue

_It was the yelling that had woken her, but not what had driven her from her bed. Sara was used to hearing yelling at night. Usually she made herself small, huddling with knees tucked up and blankets pulled over her head, eyes squeezed tightly shut. No, it wasn't screaming or crying that made her unfold herself from the bed, to let trembly bare feet touch the floor without a sound. Rather, it was the abrupt cessation of noise that had urged her out of her room and down the hall. Toward her parents' oddly, eerily quiet bedroom, the door open slightly, ajar as if beckoning._

II.

"**_LVPD!_ _Stop!_**"

_Sophia's voice carried back through the cold air, the same air that rasped harsh and quick in Sara's lungs and stung her cheeks. Panting, she raced with all her might after Sophia, through unfenced yards and down dirty alleyways. Desperately trying not to lose her. Feet pounding, shoes usually comfortable but not really made for running. Every now and then the barest glimpse of Sophia's hair swinging, flashing glints of white-gold in intermittent porch light. Blood roaring in her ears. A muffled yelp from up ahead, a metallic crash. Then a strangled shriek, grunting sounds, the faint crunching thump of a body hitting the ground. Sara put on a burst of speed, gripping her gun tightly in her gloved right hand._

"Sara?"

She jerks back to the present and finds herself looking into Brass's concerned eyes. "Are you all right?"

She nods (a wordless lie), and grips her now-tepid cup. The trembling has partially ceased now that she's wearing her coat and has drunk half of the tea.

The scrolling dialogue has not.  
You killed someone tonight, Sara.  
Shot and killed.  
She takes a moment to squeeze her eyes shut and rub a hand roughly across her forehead.

"We're done interviewing Detective Curtis," Brass continues. "We're ready for you now." Sara glances blankly around the busy crime scene, as though searching for something. Then she walks with Brass toward a semicircle of three serious policemen, waiting to take her statement. Greg stands with them, clutching his kit and looking overwhelmed. His hair is on end, and she has to resist the urge to smooth it down. She manages a small smile and aims it in Greg's direction. His eyes thank her silently.

"CSI Sidle," Brass says formally. "I want you to tell us exactly what happened here, starting from the beginning."

She tells them. She doesn't know where this calm front is coming from, but she's grateful for it. Grateful that she at least appears professional, that the cops and Brass, and especially Greg, cannot hear the thoughts that roil rampant in her mind. Sara recites every detail, clear and sharp, as though it was someone else who did these things, and she was only an observer. A stubborn, dazed part of her still thinks that it couldn't have been her. She can't have been the one who did this.

She's not a murderer. She's not like her mother.

The cops are attentive and calm, writing on their small notepads. Sara looks through them, past them as she speaks. Toward the scene. She can't seem to stop looking at it. She feels it burning into her mind, crystallizing and taking up permanent residence. The arrangement of the fallen garbage cans, the police cruisers with their brilliantly flashing lights. Neighbors in robes and slippers, arms crossed against the cold, local news vans squatting behind them. A crimson puddle congealing in the gutter. She knows helplessly that this, right now; this moment will become the stuff of her nightmares. This scene will come back to her in dreams, potent and freshly disturbing each time. Exactly like the dream about her parents' bedroom, her father very still in his red-streaked blue pajamas, sheets twisted and thrown haphazardly back, more red on the yellow wall.

And people wonder why Sara never gets much sleep.

She blinks and numbly begins to tell the cops about checking the man's pulse. It's at that moment that her voice falters. Her perpetually roving eyes find a familiar form as it strides purposefully through the crowd, flashing ID, ducking under the tape.

Grissom has arrived.

Sara's throat closes and she chokes on her words. The cops look up at her with patient concern.

She clamps her mouth shut. Watches Grissom make his determined way among the cruisers. Multicolored lights flash off of him. He doesn't look her way; his eyes are fixed on something. Sara's gaze jumps ahead, searching out his destination.

Sophia turns just as he reaches her. For a horrifying split second Sara really thinks he's going to put his arms around her. He doesn't. He places his hand on her upper arm, leans into her space as he speaks to her. His brow is furrowed. They're not close enough for Sara to hear what they're saying. Sophia gazes seriously up into his face as she replies, reassuring. One of her pale hands finds its way to rest delicately on Grissom's chest.

Sara clenches her teeth so hard that it hurts.

Finally he appears assuaged. She can't read lips, but even from a distance she always recognizes her own name when Grissom says it. Sophia looks up and gestures toward Sara's huddle of police; Grissom's head snaps around, swiveling in their direction. Quickly Sara looks away, back toward the circle of expectant cops. She makes desperate eye contact with Brass, who is regarding her with a knowing air of something like sadness. Sara inhales sharply and grasps for the thread of her story.

"I checked his pulse," she says. Her voice scrapes like broken glass. "But I knew he was dead."


End file.
